Comal ISD vs NEISD: Which School District Covers Your Address?

Families moving to the north side of San Antonio or up the US 281 corridor ask me about Comal ISD and NEISD constantly, and the most important thing to understand is that the district line is drawn parcel by parcel, not by town name. Here is what each district covers, what recently changed, and the exact way to check any address.

Comal ISD: the whole county and beyond

Comal ISD covers all of Comal County plus pockets of Bexar, Guadalupe, Hays, and Kendall counties, for a district footprint of about 589 square miles. That makes it the district behind most Bulverde, Spring Branch, Canyon Lake, and New Braunfels addresses, plus scattered pockets outside Comal County entirely.

The campus set is large and the feeder patterns are complicated, and they change. The official source is the district's own attendance-zone maps, not a listing site and not a ZIP guess.

NEISD: Bexar County addresses

North East ISD serves Bexar County addresses across the north and northeast side of San Antonio, including Stone Oak and other Loop 1604 communities. NEISD publishes a School Search by Street Name tool on its website, which is the official way to find the campus for a Bexar County address.

Whether any Comal County address falls inside NEISD is unverified, and the honest answer is that district lines follow county and parcel boundaries in ways that surprise people. The official method for a specific parcel: run the NEISD street search, check the NEISD Boundaries page, and read the school district off the Comal CAD parcel record, which lists it.

The FM 1863 boundary change, explained

This is the change that surprises existing residents and buyers alike. Starting in the 2024-25 school year, students living south of FM 1863 in the Johnson Ranch Elementary, Smithson Valley Middle, and Smithson Valley High attendance zones attend Bulverde Middle School and then Pieper High School. Students north of FM 1863 are not impacted.

For families already in the pattern, Comal ISD set a grandfather path: current Smithson Valley High students could stay, with district transport ending after 2027-28, and grandfathered Smithson Valley Middle students provide their own transport. The details are on the Comal ISD boundary page, and they matter for resale value just as much as for the morning drive.

The 2025-26 Johnson Ranch Elementary rezone

On top of the FM 1863 change, about 220 Johnson Ranch Elementary students were rezoned to Indian Springs Elementary for the 2025-26 school year because of overcrowding, per Comal ISD and reported by the Herald-Zeitung (Mar 3, 2025). Rezones are the reason this page keeps saying the same thing: the current maps, for the exact address, are the only reliable source.

School district tax rates, side by side

The school district rate is the biggest single line on most Texas tax bills, but it is only one line. In dollars per $100 of assessed value before exemptions: Comal ISD is 1.074800 for tax year 2025 (Comal County adopted rates), and NEISD is 0.982200 for tax year 2025 (Bexar County official rates). The total bill also includes the county, the city if there is one, and any ESD or special district, so compare full stacks for the exact properties you are weighing, never the district rates alone.

The check-by-address method

Every school answer on this page, and every school answer any agent gives you, has to be verified the same way:

1. Run the address on the Comal ISD high school, middle, and elementary attendance-zone maps, or the NEISD School Search by Street Name for Bexar County addresses.
2. Read the school district off the Comal CAD parcel record, which lists the district for the exact parcel.
3. Call or email the district to confirm any unusual case, including grandfathering, before you rely on the answer.

I run this check for every client before an offer, because the school answer drives both the family decision and the resale math.

Frequently Asked Questions